Wednesday, December 14, 2011

A unanimous New Mexico State Supreme Court said Wednesday that tea party Republican Gov. Susana Martinez overstepped her authority when earlier this year she fired two members and the executive director of Public Employee Labor Relations Board. The New Mexico Federation of Labor (NMFL) filed suit against Martinez’s action.
The court ordered Martinez to reinstate the two fired board members.
The three-person labor board enforces the state’s public employee collective bargaining law and consists of one member chosen by state employee unions, one member chosen by state department heads and one member chosen by the other two members. Although the governor makes the official appointments, the selection process is performed by unions, management and the board itself.
The board also chooses an executive director. It’s not clear what will happen with the executive director’s position. The board could rehire the former director or choose another director.
The Santa Fe New Mexican reports:

The court agreed with arguments by Shane Youtz, who represented the New Mexico Federation of Labor AFL-CIO, that the board should maintain independence from the executive branch because by its very nature it decides cases involving the executive branch.

Youtz told the justices that of 43 cases pending before the board at the time of the firings, 17 directly involved the governor.

I like this story because it illustrates an important point that is sometimes overlooked by progressives, who despair of the labor movement's chances to avoid complete destruction in 21st century America. The fact that the U.S. Supreme Court has a 5 member majority that is vehemently anti-worker and pro-corporation, doesn't mean that the entire American judiciary shares this extreme bias. The judiciary is indeed an inherently conservative institution, and it does in fact favor the interests of capital over labor 99 times out of 100. Yet precisely because the judiciary is conservative it will sometimes stop or slow down the attempts of the radical far-right to abolish organized labor in our country. Why? Because for many decades in the 20th century, the establishment consensus was that some level of social harmony was best achieved by allowing workers to exercise at least a few minimal rights in the workplace. President Reagan began a process of changing this consensus among Republicans, but the clear precedent, that most judges alive today learned in law school, was that workers should have at least some remedies against the most extreme abuses of their employers.

Clearly the U.S. labor movement desperately needs a massive growth in popular support for their cause, to combat the concerted attack they face from the big-money interests. We all need to work very hard to that end. We may find to our surprise that occasionally conservative (as opposed to batshit insane reactionary) judges will support organized labor. They will do so because, weakened as it is, organized labor is still to them part of the natural order of things, like the rivalry between the Red Sox and Yankees, or fireworks on the 4th of July.

Tuesday, December 13, 2011

Every historical moment is unique. Yet certain themes recur with stunning regularity across space and time. The unholy alliance of excessive economic dominance, and government power, is one such familiar spectacle. If Eugene Debs returned to us tomorrow, he could pretty much dust off the same speech he gave in Chicago on November 22, 1895:

If liberty is a birthright which has been wrested from the weak by the strong, or has been placed in peril by those who were commissioned to guard it as Gheber priests watch the sacred fires they worship, what is to be done? Leaving all other nations, kindred and tongues out of the question, what is the duty of Americans? Above all, what is the duty of American workingmen whose liberties have been placed in peril? They are not hereditary bondsmen. Their fathers were free born—their sovereignty none denied and their children yet have the ballot. It has been called “a weapon that executes a free man’s will as lighting does the will of God.” It is a metaphor pregnant with life and truth. There is nothing in our government it can not remove or amend. It can make and unmake presidents and congresses and courts. It can abolish unjust laws and consign to eternal odium and oblivion unjust judges, strip from them their robes and gowns and send them forth unclean as lepers to bear the burden of merited obloquy as Cain with the mark of a murderer. It can sweep away trusts, syndicates, corporations, monopolies, and every other abnormal development of the money power designed to abridge the liberties of workingmen and enslave them by the degradation incident to poverty and enforced idleness, as cyclones scatter the leaves of the forest. The ballot can do all this and more. It can give our civilization its crowning glory—the co—operative commonwealth.
To the unified hosts of American workingmen fate has committed the charge of rescuing American liberties from the grasp of the vandal horde that have placed them in peril, by seizing the ballot and wielding it to regain the priceless heritage and to preserve and transmit it without scar or blemish to the generations yet to come....
Defeated at every point, their plans all frustrated, out—generaled in tactics and strategy, while the hopes of labor were brightening and victory was in sight, the corporations, goaded to desperation, played their last card in the game of oppression by an appeal to the federal judiciary and to the federal administration. To this appeal the response came quick as lightning from a storm cloud. It was an exhibition of the debauching power of money which the country had never before beheld.
The people had long been familiar with such expressions as “money talks,” “money rules,” and they had seen the effects of its power in legislatures and in congress. They were conversant with Jay Gould’s methods of gaining his legal victories by. “buying a judge” in critical cases. They had tracked this money power, this behemoth beast of prey, into every corporate enterprise evolved by our modern civilization, as hunters track tigers in India jungles, but never before in the history of the country had they seen it grasp with paws and jaws the government of the United States and bend it to its will and make it a mere travesty of its pristine grandeur.
The people had seen this money power enter the church, touch the robed priest at the altar, blotch his soul, freeze his heart and make him a traitor to his consecrated vows and send him forth a Judas with a bag containing the price of his treason; or, if true to his conviction, ideas and ideals, to suffer the penalty of ostracism, to be blacklisted and to seek in vain for a sanctuary in which to expound Christ’s doctrine of the brotherhood of man.
The people had seen this money power enter a university and grasp a professor and hurl him headlong into the street because every faculty of mind, redeemed by education and consecrated to truth, pointed out and illumined new pathways to the goal of human happiness and national glory.
The people had seen this money power practicing every art of duplicity, growing more arrogant and despotic as it robbed one and crushed another, building its fortifications of the bones of its victims, and its palaces out of the profits of its piracies, until purple and fine linen on the one side and rags upon the other side, defined conditions as mountain ranges and rivers define the boundaries of nations—palaces on the hills, with music and dancing and the luxuries of all clinics, earth, air and sea—huts in the valley, dark and dismal, where the music is the dolorous “song of the shirt” and the luxuries rags and crusts.

If not for the pioneering efforts of Eugene Debs, our nation could never have embraced the less radical New Deal of FDR. What we need in 2012 is someone to clearly advocate for working people in the public sphere. Not just in defense of unions, but on behalf of all of us who produce the wealth so greedily snatched up by those who pile it up in their off-shore accounts.

Monday, December 12, 2011

It's too bad more of our congresscritters couldn't learn from these wise words of 1st-term Congressman David Cicilline (D-RI):

"Partisan gridlock, vitriolic rhetoric, and countless scandals have each done their part in recent years to eat away at public confidence in Washington. It’s a sad fact that only 9% of Americans approve of the job Congress is doing today according to a CBS News/NY Times poll conducted in October. Regardless of your political views, I think we can all agree that this is not a number we can be proud of.If we are going to put our country back on the right track, we have to restore public trust by fixing what’s wrong with Washington. That’s why I recently introduced legislation to ban lobbying by members of Congress and announced my support for a series of other reforms to restore faith in government, reduce corporate influence on our political process, and close loopholes that allow Members of Congress to benefit from their positions.We can’t begin to restore the trust that has been lost between Congress and the American people if we don’t first change the popular perception that too many elected officials see public service only as a means to personal gain. What made the Jack Abramoff investigation so shocking to so many people wasn’t the close relationship between K Street and Capitol Hill as much as the venality and shamelessness of those involved. For too long, people have felt apprehensive about the revolving door that exists between serving in Congress and working as a corporate lobbyist, but they’ve allowed it to continue because they don’t believe they can do anything to stop it. This is not the case, we can and we must do something about it. Public service is a sacred trust and responsibility, and we need to ensure that it is always treated and viewed as such. One way we can achieve this goal is to prevent former Members of Congress from ever cashing in on their positions by lobbying their former colleagues.

That’s why I recently introduced H.R. 3491, a bill that would impose a lifetime ban on former Members of Congress engaging in lobbying contacts with covered executive branch officials, or any Member, officer, or employee of the House or Senate. Violators would be subject to penalties of up to $50,000 in fines and a year in prison. While existing laws ban Senators from lobbying for two years after leaving office and Members of the House for a year, a lifetime ban is necessary to help ensure that those running for office and serving in our government cannot one day take advantage of their public office to lobby the federal government.We also know that corporate influence in the political arena extends well beyond lobbying Congress. The Supreme Court’s decision last year in Citizens United opened the floodgates for profligate corporate spending to influence election outcomes. In addition, by opening the door to Independent Expenditure-Only Committees (known as Super PACs), Citizens United allows corporations to spend unlimited amounts on elections without any requirement to disclose their activities. It’s not hard to see just how much of a threat this poses to the basic principle of “one person, one vote.”I recently joined 25 of my colleagues in the House as a cosponsor of H.J.RES.78, which would reverse Citizens United and amend the Constitution to ensure that Congress and the states retain the right to limit or eliminate corporate spending in elections. The Constitution has been amended numerous times throughout history to protect and expand the voting rights of women, minorities, and young people, and now it’s time to do the same to ensure that the voices of individual voters are not drowned out by wealthy corporate interests.Lastly, we must ensure that Members of Congress play by the same rules as everyone else. If a corporate executive buys stock based on information not available to the general public, they get sent to jail, but Members of Congress can do the same thing today with impunity. Earlier this year, a study found that from 1985 to 2001, investments made by Members of the House of Representatives performed 6% better than the market each year. In their report, the researchers opined that this performance could be a result of Members of Congress capitalizing on their “access to non-public information that could have a substantial impact on certain businesses, industries or the economy as a whole.” In order to rebuild public trust, it is imperative for Members of Congress to not even appear as if they are personally benefitting from their public office. I am a cosponsor of the Stop Trading on Congressional Knowledge (STOCK) Act, H.R. 1148, which will make this goal a reality and bar Members of Congress, their staff, and the executive branch from buying or selling securities, commodity futures, or swaps based on information that is not available to the general public. Passing this bill will make it clear that public service is an end in itself, not a means to personal profit.Even as we face mounting challenges at home and abroad, Washington has continued with business as usual – leaving most people justifiably frustrated and disillusioned with our political process. What it takes to restore faith in our government is simple, but it won’t be easy. Congress will have to enact far-reaching reforms that show we are serious about governing, even if it means giving up some of the personal benefits that come with public service. It’s time we get to work."

As a former Rhode Islander, who worked on David Cicilline's campaign, I'm proud of the job he's been doing for lil'Rhody. He is also brave to publish this thoughtful piece in last Tuesday's DailyKos, a notoriously liberal website!

Saturday, December 10, 2011

Once again, in his recent post on HuffPost, the shortest Clinton cabinet member, Robert Reich, shows why he's the greatest in intellectual stature:

"Wall Street is its own worst enemy. It should have welcomed new financial regulation as a means of restoring public trust. Instead, it's busily shredding new regulations and making the public more distrustful than ever.

The Street's biggest lobbying groups have just filed a lawsuit against the Commodities Futures Trading Commission, seeking to overturn its new rule limiting speculative trading.

For years Wall Street has speculated like mad in futures markets -- food, oil, other commodities -- causing prices to fluctuate wildly. The Street makes bundles from these gyrations, but they have raised costs for consumers.

In other words, a small portion of what you and I pay for food and energy has been going into the pockets of Wall Street. It's just another hidden redistribution from the middle class and poor to the rich.

The new Dodd-Frank law authorizes the Commodity Futures Trading Commission to limit such speculative trading. The commission considered 15,000 comments, largely from the Street. It did numerous economic and policy analyses, carefully weighing the benefits to the public of the new regulation against its costs to the Street. It even agreed to delay enforcement of the new rule for at least a year.

But this wasn't enough for the Street. The new regulation would still put a crimp in Wall Street's profits.

So the Street is going to court. What's its argument? The commission's cost-benefit analysis wasn't adequate.

At first blush it's a clever ploy. There's no clear legal standard for an "adequate" weighing of costs and benefits of financial regulations, since both are so difficult to measure. And putting the question into the laps of federal judges gives the Street a huge tactical advantage because the Street has almost an infinite amount of money to hire so-called "experts" (some academics are not exactly prostitutes but they have their price) who will use elaborate methodologies to show benefits have been exaggerated and costs underestimated.

It's not the first time the Street has used this ploy. Last year, when the Securities and Exchange Commission tried to implement a Dodd-Frank policy making it easier for shareholders to nominate company directors, Wall Street sued the SEC. It alleged the commission's cost-benefit analysis for the new rule was inadequate.

Last July, a federal appeals court -- inundated by Wall Street lawyers and hired-gun "experts" -- agreed with the Street. So much for shareholders nominating company directors.

Obviously, government should weigh the costs against the benefits of anything it does. But when it comes to the regulation of Wall Street, one overriding cost doesn't make it into any individual weighing: The public's mounting distrust of the entire economic system, generated by the Street's repeated abuse of the public's trust.

Wall Street's shenanigans have convinced a large portion of America that the economic game is rigged.

Yet capitalism depends on trust. Without trust, people avoid even sensible economic risks. They also begin trading in gray markets and black markets. They think that if the big guys cheat in big ways, they might as well begin cheating in small ways. And when they think the game is rigged, they're easy prey for political demagogues with fast tongues and vacuous solutions.

Tally up these costs and it's a whopper.

Wall Street has blanketed America in a miasma of cynicism. Most Americans assume the reason the Street got its taxpayer-funded bailout without strings in the first place was because of its political clout. That must be why the banks didn't have to renegotiate the mortgages of Americans -- many of whom, because of the economic collapse brought on by the Street's excesses, are still under water. Some are drowning.

That must be why taxpayers didn't get equity stakes in the banks we bailed out -- as Warren Buffet got when he bailed out Goldman Sachs. That means when the banks became profitable gain we didn't get any of the upside gains; we just padded the Street's downside risks.

The Street's political clout must be why most top Wall Street executives who were bailed out by taxpayers still have their jobs, have still avoided prosecution, are still making vast fortunes -- while tens of millions of average Americans continue to lose their jobs, their wages, their medical coverage, or their homes.

And why the Dodd-Frank bill was filled with loopholes big enough for Wall Street executives and traders to drive their ferrari's through.

The cost of such cynicism has leeched deep into America, causing so much suspicion and anger that our politics has become a cauldron of rage. It's found expression in Tea Partiers and Occupiers, and millions of others who think the people at the top have sold us out. And it causes some Americans to be attracted to demagogues offering fast talk and whacky ideas.

Every week, it seems, we learn something new about how Wall Street has screwed us. Last week we heard from Bloomberg News (that had to go to court for the information) that in 2009 the Street's six largest banks borrowed almost half a trillion dollars from the Fed at nearly zero cost -- but never disclosed it.

In early 2009, after Citigroup tapped the Fed for almost $100 billion, the bank's CEO, Vikram Pandit, had the temerity to call Citi's first quarter the "best since 2007." Is there another word for fraud?

Finally, everyone knows the biggest banks are too big to fail -- and yet, despite this, Congress won't put a cap on the size of the banks. The assets of the four biggest -- J.P. Morgan Chase, Bank of America, Citigroup, and Wells Fargo -- now equal 62 percent of total commercial bank assets. That's up from 54 percent five years ago. Throw in Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley, and these six leviathans preside over the American economy like Roman emperors.

Speaking of Rome, if Italy or Greece defaults and Europe's major banks can't make payments on their debts to Wall Street, another bailout will surely be required. And the politics won't be pretty.

There you have it. A federal court will now weigh costs and benefits of a modest rule designed to limit speculative trading in food and energy.

But in coming months and years, the American public will weigh the social costs and social benefits of Wall Street itself. And it wouldn't surprise me if they decide the costs of the Street as it is far outweigh the benefits.

The result will be caps on the size of banks. Some will be broken up. Glass-Steagall will be resurrected. Some Wall Street bigwigs may even see in the insides of jails.

Monday, December 5, 2011

Here's the wonderful story of Carmen Castillo, as told by Amy Dean on truthout.org:

If labor and other progressive groups are going to rebuild an economy that works for the 99 percent in America, they need to do great organizing in workplaces and communities and they also need to build deep coalitions among themselves. But that’s not enough.

They also need to translate their organizing muscle into political power. And that means looking at electoral strategies in a new way.

The progressive victories in this November’s elections were inspiring and important, but they were essentially defensive. We fended off Republican attacks in Ohio, Mississippi and Maine, but we need to be winning pro-active campaigns, too. We need to be able to use electoral politics to reinforce our organizing strategies.

We often elect lesser-evil politicians and send them off in the vague hope that they will do the right thing once taking office. But we have seen time and time again, that even when we have friends in elected positions, they often end up holding the grassroots constituencies that got them elected at arm’s length. Politicians face huge pressures from corporate interests once in power and, consequently, just having a “D” after their name does not guarantee that they will take tough stands on behalf of working people. We don’t need friends in office; we need champions.

Fortunately, activists in Providence, Rhode Island – prominently including the hotel and restaurant workers union (UNITE HERE) – are providing a model for electing officials at the municipal level who will champion the interests of working people. These progressives are creating impressive coalitions, overcoming historic divides between the building trades and other unions and translating organizing strength into a political program that can produce real community benefits.

What’s more – in an exciting special election this Tuesday – they succeeded in electing one of their truest champions yet. Carmen Castillo, a hotel housekeeper and a rank-and-file union leader, brought to her campaign the life experience of an immigrant and a single mom, along with the vision of an organizer. She is drawing on the strength of an electoral coalition that has never looked more impressive.

It Takes an Agenda

Providence’s city council has long been heavily Democratic and all 15 council members currently in office are Democrats. In this setting, party affiliation is not the main issue. The importance of having true champions in office became clear when activists started thinking big – imagining an economic agenda that could be enacted at the municipal level and would truly benefit working people.

In the past decade, social movement thinkers have recognized that not all policies must be set at the federal level, where Congressional conservatives can easily stonewall progressive measures. By presenting an alternative vision for economic development at the level of states and metropolitan regions, grassroots movements can have an impact on critical issues of housing, transportation, environmental protection and living-wage standards.

UNITE HERE has been actively involved in Rhode Island politics for many years, but in 2010, the union aggressively expanded its volunteer operation to give workers a louder voice in local elections, especially in Providence. They connected their drive with established efforts by the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) locals 1199 and 615, the Laborers, and a variety of community groups that had been working to build a core of strong progressives on the city council. In the 2010 elections, five council candidates endorsed by the union prevailed, making up a third of the body.

The point for the union was not just to get friends into office. It was to pass innovative policies that could help working people in the city in a concrete way. A key example of the types of policies they envisioned was a worker retention ordinance, which could help union members keep their jobs when businesses changed hands and reduce the temptation of subcontracting as a way to reduce decent-paying jobs. An initial version of the ordinance passed in 2009, an expanded version passed in 2010 and it has survived initial court challenges. As Chris Cook, a worker at the Westin Hotel in Providence and vice president of UNITE HERE Local 217 explains:

“If a new company comes in the hospitality industry in Providence and purchases an existing business with existing employees, the ordinance says that the new owners can’t terminate workers on the spot; they have to give them three months. This is huge. It gives workers a chance to get to know the new boss and maintain their jobs, or it gives them three months to find a new job so they aren’t just thrown out on the street.”

The ordinance has since been cited as a precedent in fights in other parts of the country. It is an example of social justice activists figuring out what decisions can be made at the local level that actually impact people’s lives – and then leveraging their organizing to produce political gains.

Carmen’s Story

UNITE HERE saw that political power at the municipal level could produce real benefits, not only for its members, but also for wider communities of working- and middle-class people. Consequently, the union has sought to further develop its political program by encouraging grassroots leaders within its organization to run for office. When council member Miguel C. Luna – a strong advocate of social justice causes – suddenly died in August, the union decided it needed a champion to replace him. The organization decided to back Carmen Castillo.

“I’ve known Carmen for 14 years and she’s been a true blue fighter for the union on the contract committee, shop steward, executive board member,” says Cook. “She can rally the troops at the drop of a dime. She’s hardcore. Of course we are excited to support her.”

Castillo will bring more than just her union experience to the Council. “She isn’t a one-sided candidate; she is also a huge part of her community. She knows what it is to pay her mortgage; she knows what it is to try and make ends meet and get the groceries on the table for her children, get them through college. She is concerned that we have clean streets to live in, good homes. As hard as she fights on worker issues; she is going to fight on issues of community.”

In a ward of largely Latinos and people of color, which have had problems with racial profiling and Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids, Castillo’s Republican opponent, Christian Chirino, espoused Tea Party-like positions and advocated militarizing the border. In contrast, Castillo’s story embodies a powerful progressive vision of what our country can be – a vision that is pro-worker, pro-immigrant and pro-American.

“I came from the Dominican Republic almost nineteen years ago with my three little girls and I started working at the Westin Hotel in 1994,” Castillo says. “I came to this country for opportunities for my family. I was looking for a better life. I wanted the opportunity to work to support my family.”

Having a union job allowed her to do that. “I’m a room attendant,” she says. “I’m a single mother. I worked hard to bring my daughters through college. Now, I want to do something for my community to give back for what this country did for me. When my best friend Miguel Luna passed away, I decided to run.”

Tuesday’s victory is a testament to her perseverance. “Sometimes we’re so tired,” she noted during the campaign. “I am still working in the hotel, I didn’t quit my job. When you are working 40 hours a week and working 40 hours on the campaign, it’s too much. But I do it because I know that to win we need to work hard.”

A Coalition for Political Success

Ultimately, it wasn’t just one union that contributed to this formula for political success. Castillo’s campaign drew support from the Laborers, the United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW), the Painters, SEIU and the Teachers Union, as well as from the city’s Central Labor Council.

The participation of the building trade unions was particularly important. Historically, there has often been a political divide between the building trades and service sector unions. However, in Providence, the modest size of the area has allowed coalitions to form and made close collaboration possible.

As Scott Duhamel, a representative at the International Union of Painters and Allied Trades and secretary treasurer of the Rhode Island Building Trades and Construction Council, explains: “Rhode Island is a small state, very much of a city-state. There is a lot of collaboration between public and private unions in this state, particularly in these dire times. We’re all linked pretty intricately right now in a number of struggles. It’s a no brainer.”

Asked about historic divisions, Duhamel cites a new generation of leadership as a key to building stronger coalitions. “There is some new leadership in the building trades and you can easily categorize them as much more progressive than their predecessors,” he says. “Since they assumed leadership there has been a big effort to make sure that different unions are aware of each others’ strategies. And it has been very successful.”

For Duhamel, supporting Castillo’s victory is a part of the building trades reclaiming a pro-immigrant history and overcoming divides with the community that have formed in past decades. “Our history, we are based on the immigrant experience,” he says. “The early building trades were manned and built by a lot of new immigrants to the United States. But we became a closed club; there’s no denying it. History shows it. In the ’60s and the ’70s, and the ’80s … we were thumbing our nose at the inner-city residents, who were once mostly African-American, but have now become Latino and Asian. But someone finally realized this was a big mistake. We haven’t connected where we should have been connecting, so around the country there are some groups that have made steps to change.”

In Providence, this push for change connected to the effort to elect champions in city council. As in some other cities, political power allowed building trade unions to pass Community Workforce Agreements, which not only mandate that major construction projects in the city hire union workers, but also that members of local communities – including inner-city communities – be hired. Apprenticeship programs facilitated by these agreements have allowed increasing numbers of people of color to enter the unions.

It is not uncommon for unions to circle the wagons when they are under attack – as they did in Wisconsin and Ohio. But what makes the Rhode Island case special and hopefully groundbreaking, is that labor’s unity is being used to win ground. What unity means is that each union does not cut its own deal with an employer or the political establishment, allowing piecemeal, short-term gains to divide the movement. Instead, different members of the coalition must look at the big picture and hold out for agreements that benefit the movement as a whole. It takes some risk and some faith to stand with an ally in demanding additional concessions once your needs have already been met. But it is powerful to see when it happens.

“Successes begets success,” says Duhamel. “All of the politicians, taxpayers, developers want to show that they give back to the community. When it’s done right, it’s success all around for everyone.”

The Road to Victory

With a broad coalition of unions and community groups signed on, Castillo’s campaign became a formidable force. At the municipal level, the limited scale of elections allows grassroots, door-to-door field campaigning to be a key factor in determining which candidates prevail. In the case of Castillo, it proved decisive. In a six-way primary for the Democratic nomination, all candidates vowed to be the friends of working people. But social movements were able to advance a champion who is looking to engage them as a partner in governing.

UNITE HERE’s Cook explains, “When Carmen ran in the primary, we had somewhere around 75 workers who put in around 190 three hour shifts of walking the streets, knocking on doors, talking to residents, making phone banking, passing out literature. In the end, we won by 29 votes.”

The very slim margin of victory made the importance of grassroots campaigning undisputable. “If we had won this by 200 or 300 votes,” says Cook, “maybe you could say she would have won anyway. But when it came down to a 29-vote victory, every person out on the doors mattered.”

On Tuesday, Castillo went on to win in the general election with close to 495 votes out of 650 votes. A representative of the 99 percent who is now taking office, she will be bringing her experience as a hotel housekeeper, as an immigrant and as a single mom to the city council. Cook takes a powerful lesson from the experience. “You can’t say it can’t be done,” he says. “I encourage people to step up, stand up and be counted and run. We certainly need more workers, more people who know what our struggle is to be elected. And it can be done.”

Congratulations to Carmen, and kudos to Providence for supporting her!!

Wednesday, November 30, 2011

Professor Cornel West wrote this fine front-page piece for our November North American Edition of The Occupied Wall Street Journal:

"We the people of the global Occupy movement embody and enact a deep democratic awakening with genuine joy and fierce determination. Our movement—leaderless and leaderful—is a soulful expression of a moral outrage at the ugly corporate greed that pushes our society and world to the brink of catastrophe. We are aware that our actions have inaugurated a radical enlightenment in a moment of undeniable distrust and disgust with oligarchic economies, corrupt politicians, arbitrary rule of law and corporate media weapons of mass distraction.And we intend to sustain our momentum by nurturing our bonds of trust, fortifying our bodies, hearts and minds and sticking together through hell or high water in order to create a better world through a deep democratic revolution.

We refuse to be mere echoes of the vicious lies that support an illegitimate status quo.Our deep democratic awakening takes the form of we everyday people raising our individual and collective voices to tell the painful truths about unjust systems and unfair structures that yield unnecessary social misery.The past thirty years of a top-down, one-sided class war on precious poor and working people—with the greatest transfer of wealth from bottom to top in human history—have taught us that we either fight together in the name of truth and justice or we lose our livelihoods and sacred honor.In this sense, the movement is already victorious: our organizing and mobilizing have shifted public discourses toward truth and justice—towards a focus on corporate greed, wealth inequality, escalating poverty, obscene levels of unemployment, the role of big money in politics, and abusive military and police power. But we have work ahead of us yet.

The full-scale bankruptcy of the neo-liberal order—of deregulated markets, unaccountable oligarchs, bribed politicians, is now an established fact of life and history.Its age is coming to an end.Our deep democratic enlightenment must break out of our narrow intellectual frameworks and our parochial cultural habitus.Like the inventors of jazz, we must be open-minded, flexible, fluid, inclusive, transparent, courageous, self-critical, compassionate and visionary. We must recast old notions of empire, class, race, gender, religion, sexual orientation, and nature into new ways of thinking and being.Our movement is a precious, sublime, messy and funky form of incubation. Again like jazz, we must embody and enact a loving embrace of the art of our collaborative creations.We must embody a universal embrace of all those in the human family, and sentient beings, and consolidate an unstoppable fortitude in the face of systems of oppression and structures of domination.We will suffer, shudder and struggle together with smiles on our faces and a love supreme in our souls. Just as justice is what love looks like in public, and tenderness is what love feels like in private, deep democratic revolution is what justice looks like in practice.

Revolution may scare some people because of its connotation of violence.And this is understandable in light of many past revolutions, such as the American revolutions against monarchy in 1776 or against slavery in 1861.But the revolution in our time—against oligarchy and plutocracy—need not be an ugly and violent one.The rich legacies of Martin Luther King and Nelson Mandela, and recent revolutions in Tunisia and Egypt, have taught us that we can deal with our social catastrophes with social compassion and that we can transform unjust societies with courageous visions and nonviolent strategies.If we equip ourselves with truthful systemic analyses of power in our minds, moral commitments of steel in our backs and a genuine joy in serving others in our hearts, then our dream of a nascent justice spread across the globe may be no mere illusion.

We are prisoners of a blood-stained, tear-soaked hope.This means we are free to imagine and create a more deeply democratic world than we have yet witnessed.”

Tuesday, November 29, 2011

"US citizens of all political persuasions are still reeling from images of unparallelled police brutality in a coordinated crackdown against peaceful OWS protesters in cities across the nation this past week. An elderly woman was pepper-sprayed in the face; the scene of unresisting, supine students at UC Davis being pepper-sprayed by phalanxes of riot police went viral online; images proliferated of young women – targeted seemingly for their gender – screaming, dragged by the hair by police in riot gear; and the pictures of a young man, stunned and bleeding profusely from the head, emerged in the record of the middle-of-the-night clearing of Zuccotti Park.

But just when Americans thought we had the picture – was this crazy police and mayoral overkill, on a municipal level, in many different cities? – the picture darkened. The National Union of Journalists and the Committee to Protect Journalists issued a Freedom of Information Act request to investigate possible federal involvement with law enforcement practices that appeared to target journalists. The New York Times reported that "New York cops have arrested, punched, whacked, shoved to the ground and tossed a barrier at reporters and photographers" covering protests. Reporters were asked by NYPD to raise their hands to prove they had credentials: when many dutifully did so, they were taken, upon threat of arrest, away from the story they were covering, and penned far from the site in which the news was unfolding. Other reporters wearing press passes were arrested and roughed up by cops, after being – falsely – informed by police that "It is illegal to take pictures on the sidewalk."
In New York, a state supreme court justice and a New York City council member were beaten up; in Berkeley, California, one of our greatest national poets, Robert Hass, was beaten with batons. The picture darkened still further when Wonkette and Washingtonsblog.com reported that the Mayor of Oakland acknowledged that the Department of Homeland Security had participated in an 18-city mayor conference call advising mayors on "how to suppress" Occupy protests.
To Europeans, the enormity of this breach may not be obvious at first. Our system of government prohibits the creation of a federalised police force, and forbids federal or militarised involvement in municipal peacekeeping.
I noticed that rightwing pundits and politicians on the TV shows on which I was appearing were all on-message against OWS. Journalist Chris Hayes reported on a leaked memo that revealed lobbyists vying for an $850,000 contract to smear Occupy. Message coordination of this kind is impossible without a full-court press at the top. This was clearly not simply a case of a freaked-out mayors', city-by-city municipal overreaction against mess in the parks and cranky campers. As the puzzle pieces fit together, they began to show coordination against OWS at the highest national levels.
Why this massive mobilisation against these not-yet-fully-articulated, unarmed, inchoate people? After all, protesters against the war in Iraq, Tea Party rallies and others have all proceeded without this coordinated crackdown. Is it really the camping? As I write, two hundred young people, with sleeping bags, suitcases and even folding chairs, are still camping out all night and day outside of NBC on public sidewalks – under the benevolent eye of an NYPD cop – awaiting Saturday Night Live tickets, so surely the camping is not the issue. I was still deeply puzzled as to why OWS, this hapless, hopeful band, would call out a violent federal response.
That is, until I found out what it was that OWS actually wanted.
The mainstream media was declaring continually "OWS has no message". Frustrated, I simply asked them. I began soliciting online "What is it you want?" answers from Occupy. In the first 15 minutes, I received 100 answers. These were truly eye-opening.
The No 1 agenda item: get the money out of politics. Most often cited was legislation to blunt the effect of the Citizens United ruling, which lets boundless sums enter the campaign process. No 2: reform the banking system to prevent fraud and manipulation, with the most frequent item being to restore the Glass-Steagall Act – the Depression-era law, done away with by President Clinton, that separates investment banks from commercial banks. This law would correct the conditions for the recent crisis, as investment banks could not take risks for profit that create kale derivatives out of thin air, and wipe out the commercial and savings banks.
No 3 was the most clarifying: draft laws against the little-known loophole that currently allows members of Congress to pass legislation affecting Delaware-based corporations in which they themselves are investors.
When I saw this list – and especially the last agenda item – the scales fell from my eyes. Of course, these unarmed people would be having the shit kicked out of them.
For the terrible insight to take away from news that the Department of Homeland Security coordinated a violent crackdown is that the DHS does not freelance. The DHS cannot say, on its own initiative, "we are going after these scruffy hippies". Rather, DHS is answerable up a chain of command: first, to New York Representative Peter King, head of the House homeland security subcommittee, who naturally is influenced by his fellow congressmen and women's wishes and interests. And the DHS answers directly, above King, to the president (who was conveniently in Australia at the time).
In other words, for the DHS to be on a call with mayors, the logic of its chain of command and accountability implies that congressional overseers, with the blessing of the White House, told the DHS to authorise mayors to order their police forces – pumped up with millions of dollars of hardware and training from the DHS – to make war on peaceful citizens.
But wait: why on earth would Congress advise violent militarised reactions against its own peaceful constituents? The answer is straightforward: in recent years, members of Congress have started entering the system as members of the middle class (or upper middle class) – but they are leaving DC privy to vast personal wealth, as we see from the "scandal" of presidential contender Newt Gingrich's having been paid $1.8m for a few hours' "consulting" to special interests. The inflated fees to lawmakers who turn lobbyists are common knowledge, but the notion that congressmen and women are legislating their own companies' profitsis less widely known – and if the books were to be opened, they would surely reveal corruption on a Wall Street spectrum. Indeed, we do already know that congresspeople are massively profiting from trading on non-public information they have on companies about which they are legislating – a form of insider trading that sent Martha Stewart to jail.
Since Occupy is heavily surveilled and infiltrated, it is likely that the DHS and police informers are aware, before Occupy itself is, what its emerging agenda is going to look like. If legislating away lobbyists' privileges to earn boundless fees once they are close to the legislative process, reforming the banks so they can't suck money out of fake derivatives products, and, most critically, opening the books on a system that allowed members of Congress to profit personally – and immensely – from their own legislation, are two beats away from the grasp of an electorally organised Occupy movement … well, you will call out the troops on stopping that advance.
So, when you connect the dots, properly understood, what happened this week is the first battle in a civil war; a civil war in which, for now, only one side is choosing violence. It is a battle in which members of Congress, with the collusion of the American president, sent violent, organised suppression against the people they are supposed to represent. Occupy has touched the third rail: personal congressional profits streams. Even though they are, as yet, unaware of what the implications of their movement are, those threatened by the stirrings of their dreams of reform are not.
Sadly, Americans this week have come one step closer to being true brothers and sisters of the protesters in Tahrir Square. Like them, our own national leaders, who likely see their own personal wealth under threat from transparency and reform, are now making war upon us."

Thursday, November 24, 2011

This is one of my favorite prayers from St. Francis, particularly appropriate for the Thanksgiving holiday:

"Praised be You my Lord with all Your creatures,
especially Sir Brother Sun,
Who is the day through whom You give us light.
And he is beautiful and radiant with great splendour,
Of You Most High, he bears the likeness.

Praised be You, my Lord, through Sister Moon and the stars,
In the heavens you have made them bright, precious and fair.

Praised be You, my Lord, through Brothers Wind and Air,
And fair and stormy, all weather's moods,
by which You cherish all that You have made.

Praised be You my Lord through Sister Water,
So useful, humble, precious and pure.

Praised be You my Lord through Brother Fire,
through whom You light the night and he is beautiful and playful and robust and strong.

Praised be You my Lord through our Sister,
Mother Earth
who sustains and governs us,
producing varied fruits with coloured flowers and herbs.
Praise be You my Lord through those who grant pardon for love of You and bear sickness and trial.

Blessed are those who endure in peace, By You Most High, they will be crowned."

Sunday, November 20, 2011

Some of the more thoughtful 1%ers who have ambled by Zuccotti in recent weeks have asked us what drives us 99%ers to occupy their world. Well MarkSumner at DKos this morning has the answer:

"No doubt you've seen many charts over the last few months breaking down income inequality in the United States. However, looking at the way money moves through the system, doesn't really capture how badly askew our nation really is; how fragile it is, and how few people really hold the controls.

Instead of looking at income, let's take a look at a broader measure of fiscal inequality. Let's look at wealth.

Wealth rolls together a number of items. It's the cash you have in the bank, the savings bonds gathering dust in a drawer, the stocks and bonds that make up your 401k. For the better off, it's corporate bonds, municipal bonds, foreign bonds and other instruments. It's your pension, if you have one. It's the stock your corporation gives you to stick around because you're such a valuable fellow. It's that vacation home in Florida, that other vacation home outside London, that other vacation home... or maybe the other six. It's the personal ownership you have in a business. It's your family trust.

In short, it's the total of all your net assets, minus the value of your primary residence (be it ever so humble or oh so grand) and your debts. So what does America look like in those terms?

It's a staggeringly uneven distribution, with 42% of the wealth in the hands of 1% of the people. Even so, a chart like this doesn't begin to really capture how lopsided the nation really is.

Let's take a look at one of those 80-percenters.

Seems like a nice, non-assuming little American, eh? As it turns out, the wealth of this average Joe or Joanne is about... $30,000. That's everything they own, everything they have to sell, outside of their house. Hey, it could be worse. The wealth controlled by the average black American is about $500.

Now let's look at the next 10% of Americans. From the chart above, you might think that this American has a bit more than those below, but remember there are 1/8 as many people in this group controlling 57% more wealth. What it really looks like is this:

Whoa! Careful there, 80-90 percenter. You might step on one of those little folks. See, the average person in the next 10% doesn't control just 4% more wealth. Each person in this group controls over eleven times as much. And that's only the start of this trip to the top of the plutosphere. Here's the next five percent.

Each person in the 90-95% bracket controls more than twice as much wealth as those in the 80-90% bracket, and 25 times the wealth of the folks we saw first. And of course, we're still far from the top.

The folks between the 96 and 99% lines might control 29% of the wealth, but that doesn't mean they have four times the wealth of the folks in the bottom 80%. Actually, they have over 80x as much wealth. Is it getting hard to see the average American in this chart? You bet it is. Your elected representatives have the same problem. Hang on, it's going to get worse.

There. That's what America really looks like. That's how it looks to elected officials who scramble for campaign cash. Oh, they know you're down there. Every few years they get out a microscope and reach down to pet your tiny, tiny head. But mostly everything you say just fades into a faint whine, drowned out by the basso profundo rumble of the 1%. Horton may have cared about the Whos, but Horton is not the kind of elephant you find in politics.

That's how America looks to corporations and organizations who are piloted by these Godzillas of the 1%. Why should they be bothered if their massive strides should squash a few ants in passing? What difference does it make if their corporate colony gets its ants from China, or Cambodia, or wherever is cheap this week, rather than American ants? The 1% measure value by wealth, and the ants don't have any. You put all the ants together, and they still can't match even the beetles that live at the 90% mark. Actually, ants are bit of an exaggeration. You know those tiny black ants that try to invade your kitchen in the spring? Compared to the fiscal titans of the 1%, you're not that big. Think more along the lines of dust mite.

The top one percent have 38% of stock. They control 62% of the interest in private business. Expand that to the top 10% — those hamsters at the big guy's feet — and you have more than 80% of stock, more than 80% of bonds, trusts, and every other fiscal instrument. Over 75% of the non-residential real estate. You know what's really scary? Even within the one percent things are heavily weighted toward a very few in the top 1% of the 1%. I'd draw them, but the image wouldn't fit on the screen.

The "ownership society" exists. You're just not part of it.

There's only one place where the ants are supposed to be as tall as the giants — in the ballot box. That's where the average person should be able to generate pressure that keeps this from being a nation of, by, and for Godzilla. Of course, it's not quite that simple.

When Onepercentus rex and friends control the message that the ants hear on their radios and see on their TVs, it's easy to get confused. When the beetles of the legislature determine that the only way to get fresh food for the giants is by taking it from the ants, it's easy to feel as if being stepped on might be a relief.

And as long as giants...

The hell with metaphors. As long as corporations are people and money is speech, then democracy is a farce. If you want to live like a person and not an ant, that has to change."

The police copters weren;t able to find and stop our guerilla projectionist! Everyone driving over the bridge into Manhattan could read our stuff. Many cars honked and gave us on the bridge a big thumbs up! Check out the video:

Having escaped the Paddy wagon, I was free to enjoy the rest of the day's events. The NYPD estimated the crowd at Foley Square to have been about 32,000 people-- that seems about right according to what I saw on the square and the bridge. http://youtu.be/fqQv3sZIUvQ All in all, a good day for OWS... the hip-hop performers at Foley Square was the high point for me!! Great bass player!

Check this out: http://youtu.be/WUxiAv5TjsQ I was lucky not to get arrested after I told the cop who whacked me twice with a baton that I had memorized his badge #. Two other cops tried to grab me, but I ran like the dickens and got away from those out of shape donut-munchers, LOL. We're really into fascist police thug tactics under the regime of Hizzoner Benito Bloomberg here in NYC...

Wednesday, November 16, 2011

Not all the news here in Gotham City is dire... this true story of concern and caring is truly heartwarming:

The sanctuary of Middle Collegiate Church in the East Village. (Facebook/Middle Collegiate Church)

By Amy Zimmer and Tom LiddyDNAinfo Staff
MANHATTAN — Churches around the borough were opening their doors Tuesday night to Occupy Wall Street protesters — who were left without a place to sleep after police cleared out Zuccotti Park hours earlier.
Among those taking in the anti-greed protesters, who first established a camp in Lower Manhattan on Sept. 17, was Middle Collegiate Church in the East Village, which said Tuesday night it could accommodate about 75 protesters.
"This is what we do," said Jacqui Lewis, senior minister at the East 7th Street house of worship. "It's not new to us."

A sign at Zuccotti Park tells protesters how to get to the Church of St. Paul and St. Andrew on the Upper West Side for shelter on Nov. 15, 2011. (DNAinfo/Ben Fractenberg)

Lewis said that those who seek shelter could expect a safe, comfortable place to sleep as well as pizza Tuesday evening and bagels in the morning.
"We're going to try to recharge their batteries," she said. "The Gospels have such a clear mandate for how we’re supposed to treat one another."
As of 10:30 p.m., about 10 people had taken advantage of the offer, including a man who had been homeless for six years.
"He said, 'The system is lousy. I hope for a place where people share what they have like you share with us'," Lewis recounted the man saying.
As for the future, she said that the hope is that Occupiers will be allowed to have their tents and sleeping gear back so that they can continue their work.
On the Upper West Side, the Church of St. Paul and St. Andrew on West 86th Street said that about 50 protesters were expected to spend the night.
"We’re doing it because that's what a church is supposed to do," said Giovanny Mondesir, assistant building manager for the house of worship.
He said that the church had received a list of protesters who planned to spend the night and would close its doors around midnight.
"It’s really not comfortable," said Mondesir of the protesters being evicted from their Lower Manhattan encampment, near the World Trade Center. "They’re trying to do something great for all of us and they're being kicked out."
The church, he said, would offer the protesters sandwiches and likely rice as nourishment during their stay.
"We’ve been getting a lot of positive remarks, especially about our reverend [James Karpen]," who came up with the idea to house the demonstrators, Mondesir added.

Tuesday, November 15, 2011

Here's a first response to the little coordinated crackdown against us peaceful occupiers, here in the Big Apple and in other U.S. cities, published by Tambershall at FDL today:

The 1st amendment is still around right? The Patriot Act, or some top secret act we don’t even know about, didn’t delete the 1st amendment from the Constitution did it? I didn’t miss a memo did I? I didn’t miss the vote by all the states to modify the Constitution so the part that says, “the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances”, was deleted/removed?

So then is the coordination by American mayors to prevent peaceable protest across America is … is this collusion?

Can some people here with legal backgrounds or legal know-how explain this to me? Can’t the ACLU just file a “the Constitution allows it so go F yourself” brief?

Sure there’s the whole public vs. private property issue, but what happens when this sock-puppet of a government sells off all public lands into the hands of the “innovators” and “job creators”, as they are currently doing? Does that mean that all private land represents a line where we no longer have constitutional rights? So all the other amendments don’t count either on private property? The Constitution has no effect on private property? Do laws no longer apply on private property? Anyone with private property can set up their own laws and their own Constitution on that property?

These are the times I wish we still had journalists. If we did they would be required to ask the mayor, and the mayor at every Occupy, details about that call. How about

“What did you talk about during that call?” What are the details?

“Who else was on that call?” “Was there anyone, who’s not a mayor on that call?” “Was it only public officials, or where there non-public officials present?”

“What was said, ie. the transcript?” And if no transcript, “Since this was on the public’s dime, and concerning the public, why isn’t there a transcript?” “At this public-concerning call, where there any public representatives, and if not, why not?” “Have the mayors committed and ethical or legal violation of their duties by this action?” “By planning this across many cities, crossing state lines, are there any legal concerns for the mayors?”

This is off the top of my head. I suggest, as others have, that since journalism is dead (replaced by the corporate media and corporatist pawns), we call each mayor’s office and ask these questions.

There is still a facade of Democracy, right? So under this facade, don’t they have to respond? And if they don’t, can we finally admit the facade is also dead?

Saturday, November 12, 2011

Here's a beautfully written piece by Ellen Brown, from yesterday's Truthout:

"Henry Ford said, "It is well enough that the people of the nation do not understand our banking and monetary system, for if they did, I believe there would be a revolution before tomorrow morning."

We are beginning to understand, and Occupy Wall Street looks like the beginning of the revolution.

We are beginning to understand that our money is created, not by the government, but by banks. Many authorities have confirmed this, including the Federal Reserve itself. The only money the government creates today are coins, which compose less than one ten-thousandth of the money supply. Federal Reserve Notes, or dollar bills, are issued by Federal Reserve banks, all 12 of which are owned by the private banks in their district. Most of our money comes into circulation as bank loans, and it comes with an interest charge attached.

According to Margrit Kennedy, a German researcher who has studied this issue extensively, interest now composes 40 percent of the cost of everything we buy. We don't see it on the sales slips, but interest is exacted at every stage of production. Suppliers need to take out loans to pay for labor and materials before they have a product to sell.

For government projects, Kennedy found that the average cost of interest is 50 percent. If the government owned the banks, it could keep the interest and get these projects at half price. That means governments - state and federal - could double the number of projects they could afford, without costing the taxpayers a single penny more than we are paying now.

This opens up exciting possibilities. Federal and state governments could fund all sorts of things we think we can't afford now, simply by owning their own banks. They could fund something Franklin D. Roosevelt and Martin Luther King dreamt of - an Economic Bill of Rights.

A Vision for Tomorrow

In his first inaugural address in 1933, Roosevelt criticized the sort of near-sighted Wall Street greed that precipitated the Great Depression. He said, "They only know the rules of a generation of self-seekers. They have no vision, and where there is no vision the people perish."

Roosevelt's own vision reached its sharpest focus in 1944, when he called for a Second Bill of Rights. He said:

This Republic had its beginning, and grew to its present strength, under the protection of certain inalienable political rights.... They were our rights to life and liberty.

As our nation has grown in size and stature, however - as our industrial economy expanded - these political rights proved inadequate to assure us equality in the pursuit of happiness.

He then enumerated the economic rights he thought needed to be added to the Bill of Rights. They included:

The right to a job;

The right to earn enough to pay for food and clothing;

The right of businessmen to be free of unfair competition and domination by monopolies;

The right to a decent home;

The right to adequate medical care and the opportunity to enjoy good health;

The right to adequate protection from the economic fears of old age, sickness, accident, and unemployment;

The right to a good education.

Times have changed since the first Bill of Rights was added to the Constitution in 1791. When the country was founded, people could stake out some land, build a house on it, farm it and be self-sufficient. The Great Depression saw people turned out of their homes and living in the streets - a phenomenon we are seeing again today. Few people now own their own homes. Even if you have signed a mortgage, you will be in debt peonage to the bank for 30 years or so before you can claim the home as your own.

Health needs have changed, too. In 1791, foods were natural and nutrient rich, and outdoor exercise was built into the lifestyle. Degenerative diseases such as cancer and heart disease were rare. Today, health insurance for some people can cost as much as rent.

Then there are college loans, which collectively now exceed a trillion dollars, more even than credit card debt. Students are coming out of universities not just without jobs, but carrying a debt of $20,000 or so on their backs. For medical students and other post-graduate students, it can be $100,000 or more. Again, that's as much as a mortgage, with no house to show for it. The justification for incurring these debts was supposed to be that the students would get better jobs when they graduated, but now jobs are scarce.

After World War II, the GI Bill provided returning servicemen with free college tuition, as well as cheap home loans and business loans. It was called "the GI Bill of Rights." Studies have shown that the GI Bill paid for itself seven times over and is one of the most lucrative investments the government ever made.

The government could do that again - without increasing taxes or the federal debt. It could do it by recovering the power to create money from Wall Street and the financial services industry, which now claim a whopping 40 percent of everything we buy.

An Updated Constitution for a New Millennium

Banks acquired the power to create money by default when Congress declined to claim it at the Constitutional Convention in 1787. The Constitution says only that "Congress shall have the power to coin money [and] regulate the power thereof." The founders left out not just paper money, but checkbook money, credit card money, money market funds, and other forms of exchange that make up the money supply today. All of them are created by private financial institutions, and they all come into the economy as loans with interest attached.

Governments - state and federal - could bypass the interest tab by setting up their own publicly owned banks. Banking would become a public utility, a tool for promoting productivity and trade rather than for extracting wealth from the debtor class.

Congress could go further: it could reclaim the power to issue money from the banks and fund its budget directly. It could do this, in fact, without changing any laws. Congress is empowered to "coin money," and the Constitution sets no limit on the face amount of the coins. Congress could issue a few one-trillion dollar coins, deposit them in an account and start writing checks.

The Fed's own figures show that the money supply has shrunk by $3 trillion since 2008. That sum could be spent into the economy without inflating prices. Three trillion dollars could go a long way toward providing the jobs and social services necessary to fulfill an Economic Bill of Rights. Guaranteeing employment to anyone willing and able to work would increase gross domestic product, allowing the money supply to expand even further without inflating prices, since supply and demand would increase together.

Modernizing the Bill of Rights

As Bob Dylan said, "The times they are a-changin'." Revolutionary times call for revolutionary solutions and an updated social contract. Apple and Microsoft update their programs every year. We are trying to fit a highly complex, modern monetary scheme into a constitutional framework that is 200 years old.

After President Roosevelt died in 1945, his vision for an Economic Bill of Rights was kept alive by Martin Luther King. "True compassion," King declared, "is more than flinging a coin to a beggar; it comes to see that an edifice which produces beggars needs restructuring."

King, too, has now passed away, but his vision has been carried on by a variety of money reform groups. The government as "employer of last resort," guaranteeing a living wage to anyone who wants to work, is a basic platform of Modern Monetary Theory (MMT). An MMT web site declares that by "[e]nding the enormous unearned profits acquired by the means of the privatization of our sovereign currency ... [i]t is possible to have truly full employment without causing inflation."

What was sufficient for a simple agrarian economy does not provide an adequate framework for freedom and democracy today. We need an Economic Bill of Rights, and we need to end the privatization of the national currency. Only when the privilege of creating the national money supply is returned to the people can we have a government that is truly of the people, by the people and for the people."